


Until We Meet Again

by tiniestawoo



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Apocalypse, F/M, Gen, Grief/Mourning, I had a lot of feels., M/M, Multi, a variation on, an exploration of death tbh, more like a - pack - alypse, not much of it sticks, pack bonds, there's a lot of death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-03
Updated: 2020-03-03
Packaged: 2021-02-22 22:36:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23001505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiniestawoo/pseuds/tiniestawoo
Summary: "Stiles loses control of his magic for a minute, the lamp he’d flicked on goes dark as the bulb shatters, Lydia’s suitcase flies off the ottoman it was sitting on, and Stiles has to take a long deep breath and grip Lydia a little tighter before the whole room stops shaking. “I need to call Scott.”Lydia looks haunted as she shakes her head, her body shaking harder as she brings her hands up to clamp over her mouth, tears streaming down her face as she holds back another scream. Stiles closes his eyes, head tilted up towards the ceiling and audibly cries out from the feeling of the ripped pack bond at the same time as Lydia loses the fight with herself and screams Scott’s name loud enough that one of Stiles’ ears starts to bleed."orThe one where the pack is picked off one by one, and Stiles makes a literal deal with the devil to get them all back.
Relationships: Chris Argent/Melissa McCall, Derek Hale/Lydia Martin, Lydia Martin/Stiles Stilinski, Scott McCall/Malia Tate
Comments: 6
Kudos: 74





	Until We Meet Again

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own shit.
> 
> Also, I don't know what this is. I was thinking about who would get the alpha spark if Scott was killed by not-a-wolf and the result was this massive fuck fest of fic. 
> 
> Let me know what you think? I usually try to keep errant plot bunnies from running loose but hey, nobody's perfect.

The day that Lydia comes down from Boston to visit Stiles in D.C. is the first day someone from their pack dies. She’s come down to see Stiles for the explicit purpose of discussing how things are getting scarier and scarier back in Beacon Hills, how the monsters are getting stronger, how it seems like someone is controlling them again. The two of them are safe, all the way on the east coast, far from the Nemeton and the monsters. They’re safe because Stiles is a spark and Lydia is a banshee and both of them are discreet and keep their gifts to themselves so nobody would dream of coming after them. 

And then, at two-thirty in the morning, Stiles is awoken readily by Lydia’s piercing scream. He’s up in an instant and climbing into the guest room bed, tugging the banshee against his chest and holding her as she shakes, as she cries. He whispers “Who?” into her hair, expecting the name of a random stranger, someone neither of them actually know.

What he does not expect is for her to turn her beautiful green eyes up at him, full of grief and pain and loss and whisper, “Melissa.” 

Stiles loses control of his magic for a minute, the lamp he’d flicked on goes dark as the bulb shatters, Lydia’s suitcase flies off the ottoman it was sitting on, and Stiles has to take a long deep breath and grip Lydia a little tighter before the whole room stops shaking. “I need to call Scott.” 

Lydia looks haunted as she shakes her head, her body shaking harder as she brings her hands up to clamp over her mouth, tears streaming down her face as she holds back another scream. Stiles closes his eyes, head tilted up towards the ceiling and audibly cries out from the feeling of the ripped pack bond at the same time as Lydia loses the fight with herself and screams Scott’s name loud enough that one of Stiles’ ears starts to bleed. 

They get in the car that night, and pray that there will be pack left by the time that they make it across the country.

\--

Scott’s death rocks the McCall pack – or, what is now the Dunbar pack, as both of the titular McCall’s are dead. The hunter who killed Melissa, and then killed Scott who had flown into a rage trying to avenge his mother’s death, was promptly killed by Chris Argent. 

That doesn’t change that Scott is dead, Melissa is dead, and Liam Dunbar, intermittently explosive 17-year-old Liam Dunbar inherits Scott’s alpha spark. 

To approximately no one’s surprise, Liam is dead less than twelve hours after Scott’s death. What is mildly surprising is that Theo, who Liam had so kindly freed from an underground supernatural prison, is the one who kills him to take the alpha power that is now no longer bound to Scott’s ‘True Alpha’ title. 

Corey, who is arguably one of the most useful members of the pack, dies trying to defend his alpha, and Mason, who is hiding for his life from an alpha chimera who can walk through mountain ash and undoubtedly wants either his undying loyalty, or his death, who just killed his boyfriend feet from him feels wildly unprepared for the situation he’s found himself in. Alone. Mason knows he’s fucked if he doesn’t get help, so he starts to call numbers.

He tried Lydia and Stiles. Neither of them had answered. 

He’ll learn later that the one-two punch of Liam and Corey’s pack bonds being torn away in quick succession had almost caused Stiles to crash as he sped across the country with Lydia. The two had been forced to stop somewhere in Nebraska. They hadn’t slept since they started driving, Stiles was exhausted and in pain and woefully out of control, and Lydia was nearly catatonic, unwilling to speak or eat or drink or do anything other than rock in the passenger seat with her hands clamped over her mouth. Death was coming for them all. 

So, after Lydia and Stiles, Mason calls Malia, who answers that she and Peter don’t really want to become Theo-chow, so they’re hiding out for the moment until someone takes out Theo. They’re banking on that someone being Stiles. Malia hasn’t heard from him, but she says she believes in Stiles. Malia also quietly admits that being a human is too painful right now, and not to contact her unless it was really important. 

But Stiles isn’t in Beacon Hills. As far as Mason knows, Stiles is in Washington D.C. and therefore unable to help with the Very Bad Alpha situation that was going on. (Again.)

So, that only leaves one number on the list. Mason calls it, expects another voicemail, but gets a gruff, “I’m already on my way. Stay alive.” 

Ah good. Well. If anyone has a chance against a rampaging alpha Chimera, it’s born-wolf extraordinaire, full-shifting Derek Hale.

\--

The sense of relief that passes through Stiles and Lydia when the alpha spark changes hands from Theo to Derek is palpable between the two of them. Stiles is able to convince Lydia to drink a bottle of water, and they get back on the road. 

Which turns out to be a mistake. 

They’re almost to the California border when Stiles crashes the jeep into a tree on the side of the road because he was wholly unprepared for what it would feel like when Derek’s pack bond dissolved into nothingness and the alpha spark fizzles into nothingness without explanation. It should have gone to Peter, he was the only wolf left, but it didn’t. It was just gone. Lydia screams loud enough that the whole tree gives way, and she’s able to pull herself and Stiles out of the wreckage and together they lay there and cry because they aren’t going to make it. The only pack members left are Peter and Malia and Mason. Stiles is still unconscious when Lydia screams for Chris Argent, and curls herself onto his chest and falls into nothingness beside him.

\--

Alan Deaton, druid, keeper of balance and protector of the supernatural creatures of Beacon Hills, was gone, for all intents and purposes. He was hardly even an emissary anymore, but he still felt the remnants of pack bonds, and he felt himself become increasingly unsettled with every snap. By the time the alpha spark had been given back to Derek Hale, who Alan was convinced was wholly unworthy, Alan decided that this needed to end. 

So he’d killed Derek Hale with a wolfsbane bullet, and trapped the alpha spark in a spelled glass vial. Chris Argent, who didn’t feel pack bonds but had lost the last semblance of a family, the last person he’d ever truly cared about when Derek Hale died, hadn’t been prepared to defend himself against a druid-gone-mad when he’d gone to confront him for killing Derek. So he’d died like the rest. He was delightfully easy to kill, all things considered. 

Alan had been unprepared for Peter Hale, however. As he bled out on the gravel outside his clinic, a part of him wondered if any of them would even grief his loss, if the snapping of his own pitifully weak pack bond would impact any of them.

Would the banshee scream for him?

\--

Stiles and Lydia hitched a ride to the outskirts of Beacon Hills with a trucker who was passing close enough that he didn’t mind deviating a bit on his way to Sacramento. They thanked him profusely, and were momentarily glad that nobody had died during the few hours drive, because Stiles was woefully unprepared to explain to a random human why the girl next to him was screaming bloody murder. 

No, thankfully, fate decided to give them that break, only to award a whopping double whammy of deaths as soon as Stiles hit the City limits. 

Lydia didn’t scream for Peter Hale, not really. She just looked up at the sky, and for one moment of the worst four days of her life, she actually smiled, turned to Stiles and said, “Peter.” It was a moment of bliss. 

It lasted precisely a moment. 

The next moment, Lydia had fallen to her knees in the Gravel and was shaking her head and clamping down on her mouth and biting her tongue and using everything she had not to follow through, not to scream, not to make the next death real. Stiles had prepared for the physical blow, was waiting both for Lydia’s control to snap (he’d grabbed a pair of ear plugs at a gas station on the way) and for the pack bond to snap. 

Lydia screamed. She screamed long and hard enough that several of the nearby trees fell. 

The pack bond didn’t snap. It wasn’t Malia who had died. 

She turned to Stiles with haunted eyes and Stiles hit his own knees. “No.” He whispered, hoarse, “No, Lydia No.”

Lydia closed her eyes and rested her forehead against Stiles’ shoulder, “Noah Stilinski.” She whispered, an impossibly small voice. 

Stiles lit ten trees on fire and watched them burn to ash. He pummeled the “welcome to Beacon Hills” sign into toothpicks. He picked himself up to his feet and held out his hand to Lydia, “We have to save Malia and Mason. They’re all that was left.”

And deal with the hunters. The hunters who had taken his dad. The hunters who had taken his pack. None of them were going to survive him. And each of their lives were going to be used to barter with the goddamn grim reaper to bring his pack back.

Stiles didn’t even care if his own soul had to go in the process. 

\--  
Stiles and Lydia make it to Malia five minutes too late. Lydia doesn’t scream for Malia, instead, she holds her close and whispers to her that she’s going to be okay. Stiles pours everything he has left into trying to save her, and in the end, it’s Stiles that finally kills the flame inside Malia and lets her rest. It’s better to be killed by someone who loves you than burn to death from the inside out. At least, in his opinion. 

Mason finds them there, clutching Malia’s body, and the 17-year-old has never looked so terrified in his entire life. He’s usually cocky, calm, level headed, but not now. Now he looks down at Malia’s body in Lydia’s arms and the blood on Stiles’ hands and he remembers watching Theo tear Corey’s throat out and he turns to run. He runs and before Stiles or Lydia can stop him, he’s gone too. 

Stiles looks at Lydia with terrifyingly cold eyes. “I’m going to kill them all.” 

Lydia closes her eyes and wraps her arms around Stiles’ neck, burying her face into his chest and breathing him in. She lifts her head and presses her lips – quickly, chastely – to his. “I won’t scream for you.” She whispers, and she sounds so, so tired. “I can’t. I can’t do this. I can’t do this Stiles they’re gone. They’re all fucking gone.”

Stiles holds her, keeps watch, lets her mourn and feel the weight of all the losses they’ve been dealt. Stiles doesn’t have time to feel. He doesn’t have time to grieve. Everything got ripped out from underneath him, and he’s going to get it back.

\--

Stiles hides Lydia in the safest place he can think of. He has to use magic to open the Hale vault, he does so, he pushes her inside, and then he closes the vault without saying a word. He can’t make her promises. He can only keep her safe. 

He has a list. An itemized, prioritized list of whose souls he’s willing to barter for.

And it makes him sick. 

Five different hunters try to kill him as soon as he steps out of the vault. The hood of his red hoody has bullet holes, but the bullets all come to a screeching halt a millimeter from his head. They all fall, clattering to the ground harmlessly. He lifts his head and stares with blank, dead eyes at each of them. He was a void once, and it felt a lot like this. He knows what it’s like to be broken beyond repair, he knows what it’s like to burn to kill, to ache. 

And by morning, so do all of the hunters in Beacon Hills. 

All of them.

\--

Stiles’ list is fairly straightforward.

His Dad  
Scott  
Derek  
Malia  
Melissa  
Liam  
Mason  
Corey  
Chris

Peter hangs around at the bottom of the list but Stiles isn’t sure if he can barter for a soul that’s already been dead once. Peter has already escaped this fate once, and Stiles is going to ask, but he isn’t very hopeful. Deaton had killed Derek, and killed Chris, so Stiles didn’t really care if he stayed dead. Stiles had found the alpha spark at the animal clinic and taken it with him. He wasn’t feeling right now, but when he was, he wanted to see if there were emotions in the spark. Also, if the next part of his plan worked, Scott was going to need the spark. Derek killing Theo had been a well-executed public service in Stiles’ book. 

So he draws the summoning circle on the floor of the Hale vault, next to Lydia’s exhausted form. Stiles isn’t sure if she’s unconscious by her own choice or not, but he’s decided that it might be better if she doesn’t see the next part of this anyway.

He’d killed twenty eight hunters in Beacon Hills that day. All the same faction, all sent there with explicit instructions and inside knowledge, and in the span of four days they’d killed all but two members of the McCall / Dunbar / Raeken / Hale pack. Stiles wondered if they understood, once the hunters became the hunted, that they’d left entirely the wrong two members alive. 

Stiles pours as much energy as he can into the summoning spell, calling forth whoever it is that holds the keys to the gates of the underworld, to whoever can bring him back the people he’s lost. He sent twenty-eight souls and he only wanted nine – maybe ten – back. It seemed like a fair trade to Stiles.

The keeper of Hell seemed to disagree. So, Stiles offers the only thing he has left. If Peter was included in the trade, he’d give the keeper of hell the twenty-eight souls he’d already sent, and his own life. He offers his own soul, the soul of a spark, the soul of a twenty-year-old who had known more death and destruction than anyone his age deserved to. His soul was weary, it was tired. He was tired. He knew Lydia would be angry, knew that Scott would be heartbroken, and his dad--

He stopped thinking, stopped feeling. 

He wrote a letter, and then he was gone. 

\--

Lydia woke to the sound of the vault screeching open, and looked up into the face of a very confused Derek Hale. She blinked up at him, “He did it.” She whispered, and then looked at the ground, at the charcoal summoning circle. 

At the letter in the center of the circle. 

Lydia’s hands reached towards it, shaking. She stopped, looked up at Derek, and dragged in a long, open mouthed breath, “I can’t.” She said, tears bubbling in her eyes. “He’s gone.” 

Derek swallowed hard and nodded, dropping to a seat and reaching out for the letter, reading it once to himself, the paper puncturing under the weight of his grip and the claws that come out reflexively. He looks up at Lydia, “He’s gone.”

Lydia screams but it’s a human scream. It’s the sound of fear and pain and anger and disbelief that they survived a trip across the country, the survived countless broken pack bonds, they survived the almost thirty hunters that had settled into Beacon Hills with the express intention of killing the McCall pack. They’d survived Malia dying in their arms and despite all of that, Stiles was just gone. Derek doesn’t say anything for a long time, just lets Lydia scream until her throat is sore, scoops up her, the letter, and the vial with the alpha spark, and sets off towards the McCalls home.

\--

Guys,

I’d say don’t kill me, but if you’re reading this, I’m dead. Kind of. I’m not sure I’m technically dying. The Keeper won’t really tell me what he has in mind for me, just that I’m worth the price aside from the twenty-eight hunters I killed. Scott, I’m sorry buddy, I know that morality is really important to you, and that you hate killing, but I had to. They killed all of you, and I lost it. Peter, if you were included in the deal, I sort of forgive you for your spree now, I get it. I get what it feels like when everything is gone.

I didn’t bring back Deaton because he killed Derek and Chris. I didn’t bring back Theo because fuck that guy. They weren’t worth my soul. But the rest of you were.

If I’m being honest, I probably would have given up my soul for any one of you individually, with like, maybe an exception here or there, or if someone still around was really clever with convincing me not to. But the fact that I could give myself up and all of you would come back?

It’s a deal I’d make a million times over. 

The hunters who killed you are gone. Gone for good. I made sure of it. If I can, I’ll keep an eye on you from the other side. I really hope it isn’t a goddamn train station.

Dad, I’m sorry. I’m sorry that I left you but you’re not alone. You have Lydia and Scott and Malia and Derek and the puppies. You have Melissa and Chris. You have family, you have Pack. I want you to live. Please, please don’t just drown yourself in the bottle, that’s not what I made this deal for. I want you to LIVE.

Scott, losing you broke something inside me that wasn’t going to be fixed. I hope bringing you back to life is enough of a good deed that you can forgive me for all the death that I caused. 

Malia, I hope you don’t resent me for killing you. I didn’t want you to hurt anymore. You’ve hurt enough, don’t you think? Mercy killings are really hard to explain to the Keeper of Hell, let me tell you.

Derek, I swear to god if you add this to your list of guilt complexes, I’m going to regret including you in this deal. None of this is your fault. Most of what you think is your fault, isn’t actually your fault. I wish I could have spent more time, tried to be a better friend, or more. Don’t isolate yourself. Don’t run away. You worked so hard to have a pack, now have your pack.

Lydia, I’m sorry. Remember that I love you. I know you’re never going to forgive me but forgive yourself. There’s nothing you could have done differently. Win your Fields Medal. Be a badass. Don’t give up. 

Everyone else, Melissa, Chris, Mason, Corey, Liam, Peter – This deal was all or nothing, so don’t beat yourself up over whether or not you should have been included. Either all of you came back and I stayed gone, or none of you came back. I didn’t want to stay with just Lydia. I’m so sorry I can’t believe I just fucking wrote that, Lydia. But all of you, all of you can take care of Lydia for me. And my dad. And each other. I’m not sure I was going to be strong enough to take care of her by myself.

Until we meet again. 

Stiles

\--

The first thing Lydia does after Stiles leaves is withdraw from MIT and arrange for her belongings to be packed up and brought back to Beacon Hills. She barely speaks to any of them, barely says words at all. At first, the general assumption is just that her throat is sore, broken from all the screaming. 

After two months, it’s clear that’s not the case. Nobody knows what to say to her. So, Derek just renovates a few more sections of the building that his loft is housed in, knocks down a few walls so they’re all one connected apartment, and offers her a room. She doesn’t say anything, just moves her things in and settles. She and Derek go for runs through the woods. She practices her hand-to-hand with him. They cook in the evenings. Derek doesn’t talk much because Lydia doesn’t talk much, but he can smell her emotions and that’s enough to know that she’s backing away from the edge she was standing on, and for Derek, that’s a win. 

Noah sells his house. He can’t live there with the memories of his dead wife and the son that paid the ultimate price to bring everyone he loved back. Noah moves in with Melissa and Chris, takes over Scott’s old room. He has nightmares sometimes, and the two of them alternate who gets up to comfort him, like new parents checking on a baby. He doesn’t dive for the bottle but he feels like he’s barely alive most days anyway. It takes months, but Chris finally gets him to go out to a baseball game. Melissa asks him to bring her dinner at the hospital and he actually does. He remembers his son, he puts on his big boy pants, and after four months he goes back to work. 

Scott and Malia move into one of the rooms in Derek’s loft. They never really asked, they just sort of did. Scott wanted to be close enough to hear the heartbeats of the closest members his pack at night. All three of them, and the uneven, rapid one that was missing. Scott didn’t shut down, couldn’t shut down. He poured himself into his studies so that he could reopen the animal clinic in the future, and at night, he buried his grief into Malia, who was only too happy to reciprocate. Malia spends a lot of her days as a coyote, patrolling the preserve, but she’s always around at night, to sit in silence with Lydia, and to offer Scott the only comfort she knows. 

Peter keeps his downtown apartment, but the weight of Stiles’ forgiveness is heavy. And the rest of the pack seems to acknowledge that if Stiles snapped the same way Peter snapped, maybe Peter isn’t the monster they all made him out to be. Maybe he’s just a man who lost everything and didn’t know what more he had to lose. They invite him to pack dinners sometimes. He gets invited out with Melissa, Chris and Noah when he’s feeling up to it. He lets himself settle into the pack and something slips into place. But he never forgets what it cost. 

Mason, Corey, and Liam graduate from High School and go off to college, together. To them, what Stiles did feels a bit abstract, a bit unreal. They knew him, but the fact that he gave up his life for them feels too much like a burden, like he paid too high of a price to include them in the deal. Stiles had specifically instructed them not to do that, but they sort of can’t help it. So, they go off to college, and they try to forget. 

Six months after they all were resurrected, Lydia finally speaks. She’s cooking dinner one night and turns to Derek and says, “He loved you.” In a rough, hoarse voice from months of disuse.  
Derek jumped hearing the words but stared at Lydia harder for the steady beat of her heart beneath them. He studied her face, her expressions, “I don’t know what I felt.” He finally settles on. “He was one of the best people I’ve ever known. I could have loved him, maybe, but he loved you.”

Lydia shrugged her shoulders, and for a moment, Derek wondered if she was gone again, the brilliant banshee silent to the world again, “Stiles had enough love for more than one person.” 

“Lydia, did you…” Malia, dressed only in one of Scott’s T-shirts, clearly having just shifted back from her Coyote padded into the kitchen, tears in her eyes, “You’re talking.” 

Lydia cocked her head to the side, tears pricking in her own vision. She turned down the heat on the stove and stared at Malia, “I was afraid if I opened my mouth, I was going to scream. I didn’t want to scream for him.” 

“Does that mean he’s not dead?” Scott asked, leaning against the door frame of the small kitchen. “If you didn’t scream for him, does that mean he could still come back?”

Lydia turned back to the food and finally turned off the stove. “I don’t know.” She said, “But if anyone could pull it off, it’s Stiles.” 

“I believe in Stiles.” Malia said, with such an honest, whole-hearted truth that all of them got chills. 

Scott wrapped himself around her and buried his face into her neck, “We all believe in Stiles.” 

\--

It takes five years for Stiles to either a) piss off the Keeper enough to send him back, or b) complete enough Hell-duties to earn his way back home. He’s not sure he’s ever going to explain to anyone what he had to do as the Keeper of Hell’s bitch. Lots of fire and brimstone. Lots of unfortunate torture. The Keeper had been kind enough to give him a private chat with Theo on his way through to the pits of the underworld. Stiles had enjoyed that moment. 

When Stiles eventually died, a long time in the future, hopefully, he’d be back where he was, and he’d continue to help sort souls, torture the bad ones, and help the good ones along to the quiet place. That was what the Keeper called the place that good souls went. It sounded nice, and restful. Stiles knew he’d never see it. The kinds of deals he made were made for eternity, and Stiles resigned himself to that quickly.

Getting to go back to earth for some portion of a normal life? Not originally part of the deal, but here he was. 

The first place he’d gone was his old house. It had gotten a face lift in the last five years, and the mail was addressed to someone else. Stiles left without bothering to try the door. Instead, he knocked on the McCall’s house door, and waited for a long time. It was midday, likely, nobody would be home.

He was, to his surprise, met with a truly shocked Chris Argent. They stared at each other for a long time before Chris swallowed and said, “Thank you.” 

Stiles blinked in surprise, prepared for a lot of reactions but not that one. He licked his lips and rubbed them together, “When people who are good, like really, truly good, die, they don’t suffer.” He said quickly, nodding, “They go to a quiet place where they can rest. So, Allison, she’s okay.” Tears pricked his eyes. Chris’ welled similarly and the hunter gave a sharp nod.  
“Your dad is at the station.” Chris said softly, “Melissa is at the hospital. They both get off at 6. You should go see Lydia and then come over for dinner. I won’t tell them you’re coming.” _I won’t get their hopes up_ goes unspoken.

Stiles nodded, “Okay. Do you… know where I can find Lydia?”

\--

Walking up to Derek’s loft – or Derek’s loft 2.0 – differed from walking up to the McCall house in that it was apparently the home of three Were’s, a baby, and a banshee. Three of whom were home, two of whom were adults. Both of which could hear him from a distance. They both heard him come up the steps and take the elevator. They both froze in place – Derek in the kitchen, and Malia holding her and Scott’s 9-month old baby in his room. The door slid open to reveal him, and still neither of them moved. 

Finally, after too long, Derek stepped out of the kitchen, and Malia, cradling her child to her chest, stepped into the living room, and both of them stared. 

“Are you real?” Malia asked softly, staring at Stiles with piercing eyes, “Because if this is some kind of hallucination, I’m going to be really mad.”

Stiles gave a small smile, his eyes flicking between her and Derek, and finally settling on the baby, “Scott’s?” He asked softly, his throat tight. Scott, it would seem, had moved on. Stiles could only hope that he’d forgive Stiles for the terrible things he’d done. 

Malia nodded, “We call him Law. His real name is a bit of a mouthful. He’s named after his uncle.” She gave a small smile. “You didn’t answer my question.”

“I’m totally real.” Stiles said, eyes pricking at the fact that a) Scott and Malia had named their baby after him, and b) another person on earth was saddled with that really unfortunate first name. Poor kid. Half way through that process, Stiles was completely sidelined by a hundred and eighty pounds of werewolf suddenly crashing into his chest and burying his face into his neck and Derek Hale _crying_. Stiles swallowed back a few of his own sobs and wrapped his arms around Derek’s shoulders. “I’m back, big guy. I’m back.”

“For good?” Malia asked, hope in her eyes.

“For all intents and purposes, yes.” 

\--

When Scott got home, his senses were immediately on edge, because he was still an alpha werewolf and there was an unfamiliar scent in his den. He threw open the door to the loft and then the world slowed down. Stiles was laying on his back on the throw rug in the living room, baby Law held aloft in his arms, smiling and gurgling down at his namesake and the uncle that they all knew was gone-but-not-dead. Stiles looked older, looked tired, but when he turned his head to look at Scott, they were the same whiskey-brown eyes that Scott had known for all his life.

“Stiles?” Scott asked, needing to know, needing the confirmation, needing to hear his voice. 

Stiles sat up and passed the baby to Malia, pressing up to his feet and walking over to pull Scott into a hug that the alpha didn’t resist. “Yeah, Scotty, It’s me.” 

“I don’t care that you killed the hunters.” Scott blurted, and felt another layer of tension bleed out of Stiles’ shoulders. “I don’t care. I’m just glad you’re back.” Scott held his brother tightly, burying his face into Stiles’ shoulder and breathing him in because _Stiles._ “Have you seen your dad yet?” Scott asked, cataloguing the scents on Stiles. 

“Chris said he was at work. So I came here first. We’re invited over for dinner. Chris figured if he said you guys were all coming over, he could get away with making a big meal without getting Dad or Melissa suspicious.” Stiles pulled away from the hug and leaned back against the arm of the couch, “He didn’t tell them about me yet. He’s afraid I’m going to disappear.”

“We’re all afraid you’re going to disappear.” Stiles turned his head rapidly to look at Derek, who hadn’t said much since Stiles arrived. “But you should know I warned Lydia.”

Stiles shrugged, and nodded, “Is that why she isn’t here yet?” He asked. “She probably doesn’t want to see me.”

Derek shook his head, “She’s been sitting in her car for an hour.” He said, “Waiting for you to disappear and this all to have been some cruel joke. Stiles…” Derek swallowed hard, “We almost lost her. She didn’t speak for six months after you left. You need to know that she’s not the same.” _She’s not your Lydia anymore._ Stiles had learned to speak Derek-Hale’s-body-language a long time ago. 

Stiles stepped towards the door of the loft, but stooped with his hand on it, turning back towards Derek, “Thank you for not letting go of her.” He said, eyes soft as they met Derek’s. Stiles had seen to much death, too much pain, too much destruction to care about the unspoken fact that Derek and Lydia were _DerekandLydia_. All he wanted was to be home, to see his dad and Scott and Lydia and his pack again. It would take time for them to believe him when he said he was there for good.

Well, until he died again, then it was game over for real. No more lives left. No more resurrections available. No more money to pay Hyperion for the revive. Game. Over. Back to being the bitch boy of Hell. 

Stiles didn’t care that he was going to spend Eternity there, only that he got to spend a normal amount of time with his friends, his family. 

Stiles stopped at the entrance to the building, and deduced quickly which car was Lydia’s. He couldn’t see through the windshield from here, glare from the sun throwing off the view, but he stared at it. “I know you can hear me.” He said, calmly. “You have every right to never forgive me for leaving you. You have every right to hate me for not staying behind, but I want you to know that I’m back for good. I’m back and I know you’re with Derek and it’s okay. I’m not mad, Lydia. I’ll spend the rest of my life being your friend and I’ll be happy about that. Just please don’t… don’t stay away from me. I’ve literally been to Hell and back for you, Lydia. You and our pack and our family. And that baby that wouldn’t exist up there. I know that you’re angry, I know that you’re scared but it’s over for now, Lydia.”

Stiles waited for a long few minutes. He was about to give up and go back inside when the door to the car opened and Lydia stepped out. Her red hair was pulled back from her face in a ponytail, and her glorious green eyes were blocked by a pair of sunglasses. She slammed the car door shut and sprinted from it, stopping three feet from Stiles and staring at him. She pulled the sunglasses up and studied him harder. She reached out a tentative hand and ran it down his arm. Stiles stood still, allowed her scrutiny. 

She stepped forward and rested her ear against his chest, listening to his heartbeat, a laugh bubbling up in her chest. She finally looked up to meet his eyes. “For good?” 

Stiles wrapped his arms around her and buried his face in her hair, “For as long as you’ll have me.” He breathed. 

\--

If Noah Stilinski wasn’t a trained officer of the law, who had spent the better part of his life facing high stress, tense situations, and hadn’t been acquainted with the supernatural for most of the last decade of his life, stepping into the house he shared with Melissa and Chris to find his son sitting on the couch with Melissa wrapped around him, crying against his chest, would probably have made him pass out. 

The rest of the scene was so absurdly normal. Peter Hale sat in an arm chair with baby Law, settling into his grandfather-hood nicely. Lydia was curled into Derek’s side on the loveseat. Scott sat at the far end of the couch and Malia was leaning against the arm closest to him. Chris was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, a towel over his shoulder and a spatula in one hand, watching the scene with the kind of serene calm that only comes with years of facing down things that shouldn’t exist. 

Noah was frozen in the door way, hands shaking, throat struggling to swallow. “Stiles?” was all he managed to choke out, surprising himself and everyone in the room as tears welled in his eyes. He forgot how to make his limbs move, how to breathe, how to do anything other than stare at the young man on the couch with his son’s hair and his son’s eyes.

Melissa lifted her head from Stiles chest, gave him a teary smile, and kissed his forehead, “Welcome back, kiddo.” She squeezed his shoulder and stood up, leaning down to nuzzle against Law’s cheek before heading upstairs to change out of her scrubs.

Stiles unfolded himself from the couch and walked towards his dad. “It’s me.” He said, his lips a thin line, quirking up at the corners like he couldn’t repress the smile, “I’m back. For as long as I can be.” 

Noah remembered how to breathe, how to move just in time to pull Stiles into an impossibly tight hug, “I lived, Stiles.” He said, crying harder, “I’m living.”

Stiles nodded against his father’s shoulder, his chest tight, “I know you did. And I’m so proud of you, dad.”

\--

Stiles gave a very brief run-down of the deal he had made to bring them all back. He explained that apparently 28 evil souls weren’t enough to pay for the number of souls he wanted to bring back. Bright, peaceful souls that would have gone to the quiet place, mostly. (Except Peter, but he didn’t bother saying that because they all knew it, Peter included). Stiles didn’t talk much about what he’d done as the assistant Keeper of Hell, but he did talk about the extra deal he’d made to get to come back. The relentless request to get a blip of eternity back.

For the Keeper, it was nothing. For Stiles, it was everything. 

They caught Stiles up on their lives, on how Melissa and John worked and Chris mostly stayed home and occasionally consulted when something supernatural came up. Peter ran a bookstore for the more supernaturally inclined and had an online presence in the supernatural community. Liam, Corey and Mason lived in San Francisco, and came home on occasion, but while most of them couldn’t bring themselves to leave Beacon Hills, to leave the last place where their lives had felt whole, the three of them couldn’t usually stand to be there, where so much had happened and so little of it good. Stiles didn’t feel any animosity towards them for the choice. If he and Lydia had been the ones left behind, they would have never set foot in Beacon Hills again, it wasn’t even a question.

Scott and Malia were engaged. The baby had been an accident, a surprise, but he’d become a beacon of hope for the pack that they were going to move past what they’d been through. The pack, Stiles now included, treasured the tiny human-ish creature. Stiles had met a lot of kinds of creatures. He’d met a lot of humans too. That baby wasn’t a human, at least not, fully. It would be years before it became clear which side of his genetics he took after, but given that three-quarters of his bloodline was werewolf, it was a good chance he would be too. 

Derek and Lydia didn’t say much about the exact state of their relationship, but it was clear that there was a level of comfort there that didn’t come easily to either of them. Derek looked less tense when Lydia was close, and Lydia seemed to only really speak when she was in contact with Derek. If Derek left the room, she was silent again, like she was afraid that without him there, she’d open her mouth and all that would come out would be a scream. Lydia had scraped together a teaching degree and taught at the high school. When the weather permitted, Derek worked landscaping, and he and Malia ran an open-air greenhouse in the preserve. (In October, every year, there was a special ‘hologram show’ where a large black wolf and a grey coyote ran through the greenhouse and wrestled with each other. The locals loved it.)

When it came time to leave, Stiles wasn’t sure exactly where he was going to sleep but ended up being carted back to the loft with its inhabitants. He laid down on the couch as everyone puttered around getting ready for bed, and just watched, just breathed. It had been a very long time since Stiles had actually slept. Hell didn’t have time, not really. It was sort of always red and hot, and bodies didn’t really get tired. You didn’t eat, you just worked. Stiles was honestly surprised that he felt tired at all, it had been such a long time since he’d felt it. 

Scott gave him a long hug, and Malia kissed his cheek and held out the baby for Stiles to coo over for a moment before the two of them disappeared towards their portion of the Loft 2.0. Stiles settled back against the throw pillow for just a moment before he felt someone standing over him and looked up to see Derek staring down at him. “Did you come to kiss me goodnight too?”

Derek’s nose twitched as the corners of his lips tilted upwards. “Something like that. Lydia wants you to come to bed.” 

Stiles drew his eyebrows together. “Huh. Where are you going to sleep?” He asked, studying the werewolf carefully. 

“In bed.” Derek said, hazel eyes sparkling. 

Stiles nodded and followed Derek towards his and Lydia’s room, stopping in the doorway to stare at Lydia, dressed in just a T-shirt, resting on her side on the bed, eyes on Stiles. “You rang.” He said with a smirk, trying to cover the confusion and nerves with sass. 

“Come to bed, Stiles.” Lydia said, in a quiet, firm voice. She sounded more like the Lydia that Stiles remembered before the world had gone to shit. “Please.” 

Stiles stepped out of the black pants he’d been wearing, and tugged his hoody over his head, tossing both of the extra articles of clothing to the side and stepping up to the edge of the bed. “Are you sure?” He asked, studying the lines of her body, the curve of her leg. He watched as Derek climbed into bed shirtless, dressed only in a pair of sweats, and watched as Lydia leaned in to rest her forehead against Derek’s. Stiles felt like an intruder, like an interloper. 

“Yes, I’m sure.” Lydia said, arcing one of her shoulders back and holding out a soft, pale hand towards him. 

He climbed into bed, taking the hand, and letting her guide him so he was pressing himself along her back. He buried his face into her hair and took a long breath, taking in the scent of her shampoo and the softness against his face. He jumped slightly as a warm hand rested against the curve of his shoulder, opened his eyes to stare at the hand, follow the hand down the arm to where Derek had extended it out to pull Stiles closer to himself and Lydia. “What about you.” Stiles asked, barely trusting his own voice.

The sleepy smile that crept across Derek’s face was an image that Stiles was going to treasure for every moment of the rest of his painfully, eternally long life. “Welcome home, Stiles.”


End file.
